What does the kitchen in Delphine's home come to represent in the novel, One Crazy Summer?

The kitchen located in Delphine’s childhood home is deeply symbolic. Delphine's mother, Cecile, who is a feminist, will not perform any cooking or home-making in the kitchen as traditionally done by mothers. Instead, she uses the kitchen for actual work, shirking her responsibilities as a mother. Cecile, with the exception of meals, forbids her daughters from entering the kitchen, attempting to bar them from the traditional way of life by keeping them away from a room most often associated with women and mothers. The kitchen ultimately becomes symbolic of the abrogation of responsibility and the choice Cecile makes, as the printing press and kitchen are ruined when Cecile is arrested. The mess she has left behind by shirking her responsibility is a mess that her daughters must clean up instead. It is fine and well for Cecile to live as she wants, to refuse to be a mother – but her choices still have consequences for her children.